


Brave Arms

by Zaedtalost



Category: Ace Combat
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-31
Updated: 2020-09-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:21:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26206339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zaedtalost/pseuds/Zaedtalost
Summary: Chapter Summary:Prologue detailing the events that lead up to the next chapter and providing some vague background to the climate in the series.
Kudos: 1





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> "Brave Arms" is a cancelled 2007-era project thought up by Project Aces to take place as a Metal Gear Solid-style stealth-shooter game. Due to the cancellation, the only source of information available is a small 1-3 slides of advertising information that gives little to no detail about the story itself.  
> This is one interpretation of the vague information given, and as such, uses primarily original characters.
> 
> This series will also likely have strong language and mild violent content; nothing too graphic will be written, I try to keep these things as tasteful as possible.

Sapin had always been a turbulent nation; shifting from monarch to monarch, sometimes having royal quarrels within the limited noble houses, with each fighting for control every few generations. To the people of Sapin, it was nothing new: The nation had survived three ancient inquisitions, and the threat of a fourth in modern times that was quelled nearly immediately by a regime change to a new monarch who was, for the time being, friendlier to her people.

This lasted quite a long time; the reign of Queen Aleksandra, _Defender of Mankind_.

But with all good things, the reign of the beloved queen soon came to an end…

After the reign of Queen Aleksandra Orellana, the most beloved ruler in modern Sapin history, the throne was contested: Rodrigo Orellana, her son and rightful heir, had found his birthright contested by Juan Lago Morata, who claimed to be the illegitimate son of her husband, though he had been dead for quite some time and Juan seemed to be quite young.

For a time, after a campaign of “truth seeking” run by the current ruling family, Juan Lago Morata disappeared; it was thought that he had disappeared due to the shame of his false claims, but this was not so. After years of deliberation, scheming in the shadows, and waiting for the Orellana heir to wear thin on the public’s opinion, Juan Lago Morata reappeared, this time with an army in tow.

It was a coup, vicious and bloody, and it was hard to believe anyone could have survived such horrific violence…

With the takeover of the Morata Regime, the royal family was nearly slaughtered; family members fleeing to all parts of the globe, with loyalist soldiers assisting in any way they could, hoping that the civilians they came across in the process would not turn them in with the hopes that there would be some reward for getting the rightful heir to the throne killed.

After coordinated efforts that seemed to be nearly impossible, the Orellana line was safely out of Sapin, awaiting the overturn of this dictatorial coup leader. With the resistance rising, the only thing they needed now was patience and willpower.


	2. Chapter One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Setting the scene, setting the stage, and introducing the hero.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> From here throughout, there will be some rough language and some violence. That's about as far as it should go for quite some time. Additional warnings will be placed in these notes as-needed.

The capital of Sapin, Gran Rugido, was now a place of tension and strife―patrols marched through the streets regularly, where they had not done so before, and citizens looked on in confused horror as these patrols of tyrant-funded bullies destroyed their livelihoods on whims―it was a place nearly unrecognizable in comparison to what Gran Rugido had been before.

Lurking within the shadows of the capital city, waiting for a chance to meet with one of the alleged leaders of this resistance, was a man named Javier Borobia: A former guard in the Gran Rugido palace under the reign of the Orellana family, now demoted and outcast, despite his well-feigned loyalty to the Morata regime. To say Borobia was a coward would be inaccurate, but he was a stealth operative and an intel specialist under the rightful regime. It only made sense that the loyalist tried to stay and collect information as long as he could.

That was why he was hoping to find “Ana”―a mysterious blonde woman who'd been rumored to either lead _La Resistencia de Capitol City_ , or be close to the person who _did_ lead it. Borobia wanted in; he wanted a chance to give the information he possessed to a group that could use it to their best abilities, and he wanted to put his skills to use in returning Sapin to the hands of the Orellanas―the family he'd come to love as if they were his own blood, whose living matriarch had treated him like her own son as a boy.

Despite these personal connections, however, he remained neutral and unfeeling; his love for the Orellana family was not what drove him to reinstate them upon the throne, but his duty to what was right, and his need to set things right for his country. Borobia was, in short, acting solely out of a sense of duty and morality, seeking to restore kindness and compassion to the throne and order and freedom to the nation of Sapin. To uphold his oath.

Waiting for Ana to show was less of a problem than it was a bore; Borobia had found himself perfectly hidden from the view of those outside, and temporarily hidden from anyone entering the room of the abandoned building in which he stood. A perfect position for observing the world below without risking being seen or heard by some unwanted party. Some time after his becoming comfortable in his perch, Borobia had located the woman, this mysterious “Ana”, from whom he hoped to gain entry into _La Resistencia de Capitol City_ , and through whom he hoped to provide them an edge.

Hearing a noise in the room behind him, however, Borobia turned to check on whether or not he could be seen; satisfied that he was still perfectly hidden, he turned back to spy on Ana for a brief moment longer, only to discover that she had disappeared from his view. This posed a problem; he’d hesitated, gotten distracted, and completely missed his mark. He’d gotten sloppy in his old age, he felt, and that must have been why he lost such a valuable position within the palace under the current regime; they’d realized that he had lost whatever edge he’d thought he had, and they had cut that potentially damaging problem down to the most minor issue they could make without outright murdering him.

“Fool…” He muttered to himself, just seconds before hearing yet another noise within the building; this time, a noise that sounded much less like it could have been passed off as a small animal roaming around in the abandoned building.

Reaching up and giving a small hop, Borobia gripped the metal beams that had been used to support the ceiling for what could have only been an attempted architectural update before the coup, carefully lifting himself off of the expected eye level of the average intruder, and into a position that he might be able to walk along the ceiling’s exposed rafters and escape unnoticed.

Waiting a moment, hoping for an opportunity to slink by without potentially grabbing the attention of whomever had opened the door with intentions to investigate what should have been an empty room, Borobia noticed that the “intruder” upon his spying was not one of Morata’s repurposed Gran Rugido patrols, but was a young woman, dressed in black, yes, but wearing a small, silver dragonfly-shaped pin on her shirt. In one hand, she held a flashlight, and her empty hand was poised to grab the pistol from her belt if need be. She was no Special Patrol, but ordinary police? May be.

“I know you’re in here,” she said, turning on the light and pointing it up into the rafters, “I know you’re not one of Morata’s, ‘cause his people aren’t that sloppy, so who are you?”

Borobia, knowing he couldn’t be seen just yet, decided to play a game with this apparent “local” officer; she could be seen by him, but he hadn’t quite been spotted yet. “Well, officer, you could consider me a curious citizen. Or, more accurately, a concerned citizen. The kind of concern that’s showing on your face right now, I think, would be a good enough example of the concern I share for our nation. You know as well as I that it’s in danger.”

Pulling out her pistol, the woman finally found Borobia with her torch, keeping him in her sights and watching for the slightest signs of hostile movement. “Why don’t you come down from there, slowly, and we can talk about this face to face. Or I can shoot you down, attract the attention of all Morata’s Special Guard patrols, and you can have fun living out eternity in a prison, knowing that you could’ve done something to prevent all of this from happening. Your choice.”

“I like you,” Borobia replied, repositioning himself and slowly climbing down from the beams, “do you have a name, or should I just stick to ‘officer’?”

Stepping back as Borobia finally touched the floor, the woman kept her weapon trained on him; “De Valle.”

“Right…” Borobia sighed, shaking his head and folding his arms over his chest. “Would you mind putting that thing away? I’d rather you not shoot me accidentally because you’re so worked up. I was looking for a way to meet with what I’m assuming is your friends, so there’s really no need for you to be this paranoid, is there?”

“Or you could be lying. How do I know either way?”

“You really don’t, so it’s up to your better judgement. I served in the palace, though, so if you know someone who spent a lot of time there just before the coup, you might be able to ask them if I’m lying to you or not.”

“Alright,” de Valle lowered her gun, reaching out and pulling Borobia toward the door by his jacket, “but you stay in front of me, I don’t trust you yet.”

“Fair enough. Is it a long walk to where we’re going?”

“No. No jerking around, no silly detours, we’re going straight there, and if we don’t like what you have to say, then it’s the last stop you make. I’ll tell you where to go.”

De Valle hadn’t lied, it was a fairly short walk from the abandoned building to where she wanted them to go; a home that seemed to have sat empty for quite some time, its front door hidden down an alley, overlooked by nearly all who ventured past it, save for those who truly knew what they were looking for.

Entering the door, it took a moment of de Valle looking around before she closed the door and called out: “Papi? Tía? One of you better be home, don’t tell me you left me here with this.”

Before he knew what was happening, Borobia felt a tight grip around the back of his neck, freezing him further in his place. How this person managed to find their way behind him without being seen, he had no clue. But the fact that they did meant that this person must have been one hell of a hunter… Of both man and beast.

“Lola,” it was a man’s voice that spoke behind Borobia, and it was presumably this man that was holding him fiercely in place, “why did you bring this walking dumpster fire into my house? Do we not have enough problems, you have to start bringing this kind of garbage into my nice, clean home?”

The man speaking seemed familiar, though Borobia could not see him just yet. Something in his voice, a playful sort of tone that made the insults all the more bearable for the time being, seemed almost like the memory of a ghost to Javier, who was now trying his hardest to recall where he’d heard such a voice before.

Finally, the man stepped forward into Borobia’s view; he was an older man, dark brown hair greying, his flesh partially baked by the sun, though his dark eyes still held a fire in them that could only mark him as one of Sapin’s finest.

“Yeah, well, he says he was a palace guard before all this shit happened, so what do you think?” Lola asked, walking over to a table and sitting down. “Seen him before?”

“I have.” The older man’s response was short and dry, his eyes squinting at Borobia for a moment before finally turning him loose. “I’ve met him before. His name is Borobia, and believe me, he’s not someone who would take Morata’s side. This man would take his oath to defend the throne very seriously.”

“You know me, but I’m not so sure I can say the same.”

Borobia was interrupted partially by the man realizing this; “Ah, forgive me. My name is Arturo de Valle. When we met, I was―still am―called Cazador.”

“You’re the pilot I nearly sh―”

“Nearly shot in the face, yes. Good detective work, dumpster fire.”

“Yeah… S-sorry about that.” Borobia let out a nervous chuckle and rubbed at the back of his neck, trying to ease the ache Arturo’s grip had caused.

“Well, a few inches to the right and Lola would’ve grown up an orphan. Maybe you’d have done her a favor, but I appreciate your inability to aim more than anyone right now.”

“Can you two stop?” Lola set her cup down roughly on the table, “Next thing I know, somebody’s gonna be reaching for a tape measure.”

“Now that,” Arturo interrupted with a grin, “ _that_ is not a bad idea. Though I must say I would use it on your wrist, little one, because that was _beyond_ out of line, and I never want to hear you speak to me that way again. Understood?”

Borobia couldn’t help but laugh; the conversation, awkward as it was, seemed no less out of place than anything else he’d encountered in the short period of events since losing track of Ana in the market square in the city’s now-decaying commercial district. It was, for all its strangeness and crass subject matter, a welcome change from the tension of daily life under Morata’s rule. The seemingly commonplace conversation between father and daughter had managed to ease the heightened stress of everything going on in the world to a dull ache for now, as well as remind Borobia just exactly what it was he was fighting for: All the similar people in their nation, and all those dissimilar who simply wanted to live their lives unobstructed and without fear.

“As for you,” Arturo’s words broke the hazy silence in Borobia’s mind, bringing him back around to reality at a slow crawl, “if you want to join our pathetic little gang of miscreants that are looking to take back the world from that miserable tyrant, welcome aboard. This is the door to reaching the resistance, and if you’re serious―which you’ll have to prove―I’ll take you to the resistance proper. If not, then the only ones in any real danger, I suppose, is myself and Lola… And between you and me, I would not want to be hunted by either of us, were I in your position. They do not call me _The Hunter_ for no reason, you understand.”

“I’d assume you were a decent enough man to pass those skills on to your daughter, then?”

“Precisely. What kind of man would I be if I didn’t at least part with something useful for my children before I died?”


End file.
